1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method and apparatus for management of individual cells in a battery system, particularly electrochemical, rechargeable cells.
2. Discussion of Related Art
Typically, battery systems, such as battery banks or strings, include a plurality of individual cells. A “cell” can mean a single electrochemical cell comprised of the most basic units, i.e. a positive plate, a negative plate, and an electrolyte. However, as used herein, the term is not so limited and includes a group of basic cells that can comprise single unit as a component of a battery string. A battery or battery string is a series connection of units or individual cells.
There is a tendency for each cell within individual batteries, when connected in series, to have a different characteristics, such as energy storage capacity and discharge rates. These differences are caused be many variables including, but not limited to, temperature, initial tolerances, material impurities, porosity, electrolyte density, surface contamination, and age. A low-capacity cell will typically discharge more rapidly than the other cells. An overly discharged cell develops poor recharging characteristics and can be permanently damaged. A damaged cell will affect the operating characteristics of the entire battery. The damaged battery will have lower capacity and will become discharged more rapidly than a healthy battery. The failure of an individual cell can cause substantial damage to the battery system and accompanying equipment. For example, recently the failure of one cell of a battery string caused an entire turbine generator to be destroyed. Therefore, a need exists for a system to monitor individual cells and to prevent overly discharging cells.
Various mechanisms have been developed to monitor and charge cells in a battery string. The classical means for controlling a batter is to balance the cells through equalization charging. This involves passing a low current through the battery pack thus charging the low cells while the fully charged cells slowly evolve gas (through electrolysis). It is done at a low current to minimize damage to the “good” cells. However, balancing is a slow process. Also, continuous charging of the battery may cause some cells to be overcharged, which further damages the cells. Other prior art approaches use complicated circuits connected to each cell for voltage monitoring and charging control.
Devices in the prior art are capable of detecting failing cells and responding to protect the remaining cells of a battery. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,258,244 measures voltage differences across individual cells using internal impedances of each cell. Failing cells, as determined by an increase in their internal impedance, may the be isolated from the other cells. U.S. Pat. No. 4,871,956 monitors the condition of cells by sequentially sampling the voltage of each cell and comparing the sampled cell voltage with a reference voltage to generate voltage differences which are stored in a shift register for each cell. If the voltage difference is sufficiently high, the cell is isolated from the other cells.
However, such systems have generally not automatically managed batteries effectively, or in a cost-conscious manner. Furthermore, such systems have not utilized the processing power of computers in connection with battery management. The lack of consistent individual treatment leads to premature deterioration, individual cell failures and failure of the entire battery string or bank, which in turn can lead to costly problems or downtime in the system that the battery serves.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,206,578, is exemplary of battery chargers that control only the external battery charge for an entire battery, rather than addressing the individual cells of the battery. Generally, such systems turn off, up or down the external battery charger to improve the condition of one cell at the possible expense of the other cells of the battery. The device of the aforementioned patent does not have the capability of singling out individual cells and then charging those cells. The device of the aforementioned patent does not appear to have electrical isolation from ground. Generally, the device of the aforementioned patent would tend to have noise problems in an industrial environment. Additionally, the device of the aforementioned patent does not appear to have the ability to store test data, nor does it have the ability to analyze the voltage of the individual cells or perform capacity tests.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,498,950 discloses a system for charging and monitoring automotive batteries that purports the ability to measure the voltage of constituent cells individually. Nevertheless, other than measuring the voltage of the cells and charging them when they are not fully charged, the system does not offer a comprehensive ability to manage a battery system.
Other examples of devices relating generally to the present invention, and incorporated by reference herein, include U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,743,830; 4,331,911; 5,283,512; 4,303,877; 4,820,966; 5,153,496 and 5,136,231.
Additionally, the need has long existed for an electronic, computer-based battery management system that is transparent to the equipment connected to the battery and is suitable for electrically noisy environments. Therefore, a need exists for a comprehensive battery monitoring system which can monitor individual cells or units of multiple cells within a battery string and can properly manage the system to obtain improved battery performance.